Bassetlaw: Junior doctor admits false rape claims

The woman claimed two men dragged her into an office and threatened her with a knife before sexually assaulting her.

She said they restrained her with ropes, cut her with a knife, burned her with a cigarette lighter and injected her with drugs during an attack they filmed on a mobile phone, the Medical Practitioners Tribunal Service heard.

The medic claimed two doctors at Bassetlaw District General Hospital were involved in the assault, which left her pregnant, although they did not rape her.

Following the attacks she claimed she had received “funny bleeps” on her hospital pager and was warned “I know you have told someone” when she replied.

She later told colleagues about a second attack in which she was threatened by a knife by two men who took her into a hospital building and raped her.

The doctor reported the incidents to police, but later admitted in an official statement that she had lied.

She now admits the rape allegations were false, but insisted she was physically attacked on two occasions.

The doctor is facing a fitness to practise panel in Manchester to decide if she will be allowed to continue her career.

Simon Jackson QC, for the General Medical Council (GMC), said she was never assaulted and her actions in inventing the allegations were dishonest and misleading.

“The GMC point out that as a result of these false complaints of rape the trust undertook an investigation and spent in the region of £10,000 to increase security and two police forces investigated these false allegations of rape,” said Mr Jackson.

“The doctor’s conduct in making these false allegations was dishonest and misleading.”

The doctor’s allegations first came to light when she told a colleague and friend she had been the subject of an attack a week earlier in April 2011.

“It was plain that at the time this first account was given she was upset and distressed,” said Mr Jackson.

Over the following days more details of the alleged assault were offered up by the doctor.

“She said two men, one of whom had tattoos on his arm, followed her into the room, produced a knife and used that knife to threaten her,” said Mr Jackson.

“As a result of being taken hold of she had struggled. The two men tied her up and she had banged her head,” he added.

“She said it was sexually motivated and that was all the detail that had been given on that occasion.”

The doctor later told her colleague, Dr Jen Middleton, that in the course of the attack she had been cut with the knife and sustained a back injury.

“She said during the course of the attack she had been burned by one or both of the men using a cigarette lighter,” said Mr Jackson.

Dr Middleton was concerned and spoke to another colleague, Dr Laura Smy, about the alleged attack.

Mr Jackson added: “In the days that followed those initial declarations the doctor then made further, now admitted false declarations to a senior manager, Mr Peter Wilson.”

“Those false declarations were made to a number of people.”

During those weeks she reported receiving strange bleeps on her pager, threats over the phone and indicated two doctors may have known about the attacks.

Dr Smy told the hearing: “[She said] that they had watched the film, that she looked like she had enjoyed it and then threatened her with a repeat attack if she told anybody.”

The woman eventually contacted South Yorkshire Police to report the first alleged assault on 2nd June.

The next day she told Dr Smy that she had been attacked again earlier that same day in a hospital car park.

Dr Smy told the hearing she invited her to her house where she arrived with a nose bleed and a cut behind her ear.

“She said she had been threatened by two men with a knife, that she was taken into the Post Graduate Medical Education Centre where she had been raped again and cut with a knife in the course of what would have been the second rape,” said Mr Jackson.

“The police were now involved and in the course of the investigation the doctor was expected to provide a statement,” he added.

“She admitted she had not been raped or sexually assaulted in either incident. She felt she would not have been taken seriously if the allegation was not a serious assault.”

“She said that both incidents did occur in as much as they were physical assaults.”

The doctor admitted to a number of charges including making false declarations to colleagues and police that she had been raped by two men in April 2011 and on another occasion in June 2011.

She denies lying about certain details of the attacks, which she maintains did occur, and denies dishonest and misleading conduct.

A spokesman from Donacaster and Bassetlaw Hospitals NHS Trust said the trust would prefer not to comment until the tribunal had concluded.

The hearing continues.